Reno’s new overflow homeless shelter is operating near capacity this holiday season, as the number of homeless in Reno swells …

When the City of Reno and
Washoe county completed a new homeless services campus in 2005, they expected
to grow slowly into the facility, but within months, the new shelter was at
capacity, and a few weeks ago, some were turned away. Within days, an overflow facility was opened
and it too is full. According to shelter
manager Rick Redding, before the overflow people were sleeping all over
downtown.

Until the overflow, we were finding on average three to five men and
women just in that small little area … one of the first weeks, we pulled a
seventy-two year old women out of a dumpster who had been sleeping in there
with three other men, just to get out of the cold.

Now, no one seeking a warm place
to sleep is without a bed, but if trends continue, expanded facilities will be
needed by next winter. It’s estimated
that Reno’s homeless population has more than doubled over the
past five years. And in a new trend, many
seeking shelter hold full time jobs.